Residents to tour Alternative Community Resource Program

Residents in the Rockwood Area School District will have the chance Tuesday to tour the new Alternative Community Resource Program that is located within the Rockwood Area High School.

According to the program's director, Jeff Rowe, the community will be able to visit the classrooms.

"We are basically opening our doors and allowing them to come in and see the facilities," he said. "They can ask us any questions."

The open house will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. and the school board's meeting will begin at 6:30 p.m. for a committee meeting and at 7:30 p.m. for the regular board meeting.

Both meetings are held in the administration office and are open to the public.

Rowe said that the facilities are almost complete.

"We have the gates up and we do have a few other things to add, including a few doors," he said. "Other than that, they will be able to get an idea how things are here."

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At the school board's last regular meeting in September, several parents voiced concerns regarding the opening of an ACRP in an area within the district.

Through the program, students from the district and others with discipline problems or problems with learning in a typical classroom can go to school and learn in a controlled environment.

In the agreement, ACRP would pay the district $1 for rent during the first year and $1,000 for each month in years two and three of the contract.

During the first year of the contract, the program's staff will have the facility renovated at no cost to the district.

The program will operate during the school year and eight weeks during the summer months.

A maximum of 24 students can participate in the program.

Also, ACRP will retain 75 percent of the Alternative Education Grant money for Disruptive Youth Grant and the school district will retain 25 percent.

ACRP gives those students a second chance at learning and it serves more than 100 students in Cambria and Somerset counties.

The goal at each of ACRP's three alternative schools is to offer troubled students the opportunity to continue learning, while overcoming such disruptive behaviors.

ACRP is a non-profit agency working to provide alternative education to students and it partners with the Greater-Johnstown, Rockwood and other Somerset County school districts to offer alternative education to students.

It also is partnered with the Cambria Heights School District in northern Cambria County to offer alternative education to students.

Progress has been made in the past few months to renovate that portion of the school so classrooms can be made. The area is isolated from the rest of the school.

Last year when the district has to pay to transport one student to the program in Somerset, the district had to pay roughly $50,000 that school year.

Having the program in the district alone would save at least that much annually.

The parents' concerns focused on the amount of interaction the students in the program would get with the other students in the school district within the public school setting.

The district's acting superintendent Brian Coughenour and Rowe both said at the September meeting that the students are heavily chaperoned and they arrive after the other students are in their classrooms and leave before the students are dismissed at the end of the school day.

Of the maximum of 24 children in the program, Rowe said there are eight staff members.

"Eventually, I hope that we can work things out that I can give my students the opportunity to get out and have the use of the gymnasium," Rowe said at the September meeting, adding that the students would not use the facilities while the district's students are using them.

To ease parents' minds, the board members suggested that an open house be scheduled.

Since that time, Rowe said he has heard no further feedback from he community.

"I really haven't heard anything, but we will be here Tuesday evening to answer any questions or concerns they may have," he said.